The futures we leave
by Susano'o no Kenshin
Summary: The aparoid war has just been won, yet all is not as it seems deep down. A rather routine distress signal from Fichina leads to much more than Fox, or anyone, had expected to find out about themselves, and the world around them. Rated M, for language and violence.
1. Beginnings

Chapter 1: Da Capo: The beginning.

Alright, I owe everyone reading this an apology. My original story New Beginnings was quickly turning into a disaster, and I didn't like where it was taking me. So I decided to stop it after writers block got to me too. And now, here we are with a new story, same vague premise, and hopefully exponentially better writing. So, without further ado, Let's get this party started.

Before I forget, a big thank you to every one of the reviewers who leant some creative criticism for my other fic. Radredknuxfan, , Serpent P (read his story Reptilia if you haven't, I enjoy it greatly.) as well as the every wonderful Jaslazul for his criticism of another of my wolf/fox fanfictions. You all did a major part in helping me get back on my feet, and I couldn't find a way to say thank you other than this. So thanks for your help, inspiration, and encouragement.

Disclaimer: I do not own StarFox or any of its proprietary merchandise. Sorry.

* * *

The day had droned on, meeting after meeting; interview after interview, until the red fox couldn't take it anymore. "Peppy, if anyone asks where I went, just tell them that I had something important to attend to, will you?" Fox grumbled, shaking his head as he ran his hand along the back of his neck to try to calm down his hackles. He never was one for sitting around all day and listening to people complain about financial troubles this, or political standing that. The vulpine spun on his heel and quickly exited the room before another reporter could flag him down. _ For the love of the gods, if I had to listen to one more of that mindless droning, I'd probably have shot someone. _He thought to himself with a tired groan.

"Ah, there you are, Fox." Spoke a voice from a few yards behind him and to his left. " I just had some official wonder where you went. Must be tough being a celebrity." The voice of the Katinian defense captain called with a light chuckle. "It's been a while, Fox."

"Yeah, It has, Bill. Captain now, huh? The times have treated you well." Fox chuckled, which prompted the husky to clap him on the shoulder. "I guess I shouldn't have expected less from my academy flight-mate." He grinned slightly, letting himself relive some of the old memories.

"Uh-Huh, but had your ass not shown up and saved us from that giant flying mothership thing back in the Great War, we wouldn't be here having this conversation, commander." Bill grinned. He knew Fox hated the official title he was given, seeing himself as an equal to his squad mates, instead of their commanding officer. "Heh, but anyways, I told the guy looking for ya that I hadn't seen ya. I can understand just how hard it can be to deal with so many politicians." He laughed.

"Yeah, they're definitely something hard to deal with. The only problem I have is that they just like to talk and talk and talk. They're like some of Andross' Generals that we had to fight to get to venom during the War. Chatty, without ever really knowing what they're talking about. Hell I heard one of the politicians say something about instituting social boundaries, whatever the hell those are." Fox grumbled. The vulpine had often wished he could just punch something whenever he had to listen to the self-entitled politicians who were always only thinking about the Cornerian populace in terms of numbers, instead of terms of individuals.

"Huh, Really? Social boundaries? That's just messed up. They seem to be trying harder and harder to separate the lower class from everyone else. It's not going to be pretty if they do either. Hell, might even bring about a civil war if that does happen. Let's hope it doesn't. We had enough trouble just stopping Andross. We don't need all of Corneria in an uproar either." Bill sighed, shaking his head as he rubbed the bridge of his snout. "Soon they'll be deciding to cut off the Blue District off from the rest of the surrounding area, huh?" he grumbled.

"Yeah, well I'm sure General Pepper won't let it get that far." Fox muttered, shaking his head despairingly at what the higher-ups of the planet were deciding was best for its inhabitants. He chewed on his lower lip in a nervous habit as he felt the hair on the back of his neck raise up in a familiar warning that some stupid reporter was nearby. An old habit that didn't die hard, he supposed. Fox looked around and bit back a curse as he saw a short old badger, microphone in hand, and camera crew following him. "Sorry to cut the conversation short, Bill, but I'd rather not talk to another reporter today." He explained hurriedly, ignoring the husky's bark of laughter as he scurried away quietly to avoid detection by the said badger. He managed to slip away easily, not that it surprised him. The reporters he had encountered so far were not the brightest. He still didn't feel like he should have left Peppy like that, but hell if he would listen to more " "s from unknown strangers. He sighed again.

Solar had just reached its peak in the sky, signaling that it was just reaching noon. "Ugh, four hours and that banquet thing is still going on?" the vulpine murmured to himself, rolling emerald green eyes at the sidewalk in front of his boots. "I should probably get away from here before a crowd leaves and spots me." He grumbled. Sure he was taking drastic measures to avoid simple reporters, but it was justified. To him anyway.

A beep from his communicator told him that he had an incoming text message. **The banquet is ending, finally. Watch out for crowds Fox. And Pepper said he wanted to speak to you later, by the way. We'll stop by the hotel rooms after a bit. See you there. –Slippy. **

Fox grumbled as he made his way to the familiar hotel room they were staying at. The crew would be at their own respective living quarters, had this banquet not been held practically on the other side of the planet in the high-class sectors. The commute from apartments to the location would have taken a few hours at most, and the banquet was to be held in the morning. No one wanted to make the 6 hour travel at midnight to get there on time. Everyone had agreed that staying at a local hotel would be more practical.

* * *

Arriving at the Hotel they were staying at, a rather fancy one at that, Fox waved at the receptionist, the tigress giving him a meek smile and a rather timid wave, doing nothing to hide the blush that spread across her features from acknowledgement by _the great Fox McCloud. _He rolled his eyes once he was in the elevator. The females these days were all the same. Some sort of small shirt that made their breasts look bigger, and the same short shorts that barely covered their rear, let alone their legs. It was enough to disgust Fox, to be honest. He had always cared more about a girl's personality than her looks. Looks to him were just a bonus. He sighed inwardly as he forced his mind away from that train of thought before he had more problems to worry about than just what general pepper wanted to do with him.

"Ah, Fox, how nice of you to finally call, I was beginning to think that your teammates didn't let you get word that I need to speak to you about a mission." _Speak of the good General, and he shall be there _Fox thought, biting back a sigh from his lips. "By the way, it's a shame you left the banquet the time you did, they had just brought out a very delicious brisket." The general chuckled, giving Fox a knowing wink. He knew just as well as Fox did that paparazzi bothered the mercenary.

"Yeah yeah, Must have been delicious." The retort slid off of Fox's tongue as naturally as ever. He was too used to this playful banter between him and the General of Corneria's army. "So what do you need us to do?" he asked, deciding to get right down to the heart off things before General Pepper could make any more comments about how he should have stayed at that stuffy party anyway.

"We've received Distress signals from a single base on Fichina. Orion base has been broadcasting this distress signal for the past few days, and the content hasn't changed of the encryption. Whoever's sending this distress signal doesn't want a specific code to come in contact with the wavelengths. Or so the Intel department has told me. I don't know the specifics." Pepper explained, occasionally stopping to take a sip of water that had been placed just out of the holoscanner's field of vision.

"Uh-huh. And so instead of sending a trained military squad out, you're going to send mercenaries like us to take a look at it instead?" Fox rolled his eyes again, sarcasm dripping from his words as was his normal protocol when dealing with an old friend like Pepper. "What could we do that a small squadron couldn't? I mean, Not to say we won't do it, and I'm sure the pay is pretty good as well." He quickly affirmed at Pepper's chuckle and the glint in his eyes that told Fox that he would do just as the vulpine suggested if the idea came up any other time.

"Well, for one, it'd get you and your team off planet and away from the politics again, and give you something to do. The only downside is you'd have to take a military cruiser." Pepper explained again, noticing Fox's wince when he was reminded that the Great Fox was still currently out of commission due to the assault on the Aparoid home world. "But, other than that, it'd be a free trip, easy mission, and even easier money." He chuckled. "Given it doesn't turn into a life-or-death situation anyway." Pepper smiled slightly, ignoring Fox's despaired eye roll at the reminder of how every one of the missions he takes ends up a life or death situation somehow.

"Fine, we'll do it. When do we leave, sir?" Fox said after grumbling to himself for a few moments. He grabbed a notepad nearby and got ready to write information down. No use telling his teammates if he forgot the information he had been told before they got back from their little excursion. And knowing Falco, he probably wanted to lead the other three off on some sort of bar binge and get them wasted, so who knew when the trio would be back. He looked at the hologram of the bloodhound, who was wearing an amused expression at his use of a pen and paper instead of the usual holopad. "What? I like to have something that won't get accidentally erased for important information." Fox muttered, as if the general's scrutiny was an admonishment for using 'primitive technology'.

"Heh, no no, I can understand the sentiment. But you are scheduled to leave Tomorrow morning at 0900 from the local spaceport. We are having a carrier load your Arwings and fly it's way over to the Green-Sector Spaceport. It will be waiting for you at the appropriate time for the Rendezvous." Pepper chuckled as the vulpine mercenary rolled his eyes yet again. "Good luck on the Job, Fox. Pepper out." Pepper murmured curtly as his hologram disappeared, leaving Fox to slump into the nearby couch and sigh.

"Great, another mission, right after a stuffy banquet, and right in the damn morning." Fox sighed._ Guess it can't be helped. At least it's an easy one. But the distress signal has been going for days, he said. And they have a rather powerful encryption on the signal. They don't want anyone getting to that message other than a certain person, and judging by how Pepper wanted us to go instead of a generic squad, it must have been us this person needed to see._ Fox's musings were brought to an end as a loud crash brought his attention to the entrance hall of the large penthouse suite. His hand directly shot to where his trusty FS-18 blaster pistol had usually rested. He stumbled momentarily when he didn't meet the worn handle. His fears were removed entirely when he heard the loud voice of Falco Lombardi singing some song off the radio badly out of tune, obviously smashed beyond normal for the falcon. He sighed, shaking his head as he worked to smooth the fur on his tail that had stuck straight out in his distress.

"Oh hey Fox! There you are. We were looking all over for ya buddy." Falco slurred, stumbling over to the vulpine and putting a wing around his shoulder. The man reeked of cheap alcohol. "Found this cute vixen who was dying to meet ya, bud." He grinned. "I mean god, You two saw the rack on her, didn't ya!?" Falco exclaimed, throwing his arms out in a rather large berth in front of his chest, as if to try to emulate the vixen's bust. "God, must have easily been Double D's. Had she not been so into meeting the 'great Fox McCloud' I might have had a go at her." He grinned before Fox gently pushed him out of his personal space.

Fox rolled his eyes at the falcon's antics, sighing. "Well you better sober up soon, Falco. We've got a mission to go on tomorrow, and if you're too busy having a hangover, I will personally drag you into a cab." He laughed at Falco's horrified expression, deciding that it was more fun to mess with his friend's mind at the moment. "I might just tie you to the roof on the way to the spaceport." He laughed even harder as the falcon worked to repress a cry of despair at the thought. "But all jokes aside, the rendezvous is supposed to be at 0900 tomorrow morning. So we need to be up bright and early to be ready. The mission is to investigate a rather persistent distress signal in Orion base in Fichina, so we need to be ready for the travel. A military cruiser will be taking us and our Arwings to the planet. That's all. Dismissed." He finished, more out of habit than actual need to get everyone to do their thing. Peppy merely nodded and chuckled softly, heading to his own room within the suite.

"Aw come on Fox. That's not fair, tying me up to the roof of the cab." Falco grumbled, already starting to fall asleep due to the large amount of alcohol in his system. He seemed to fully believe Fox's threat. Fox helped the bird into his room and into the bed, sighing. Tomorrow was going to be a long day of dealing with Falco's mutterings about his hangover. He turned out the lights as he heard Falco's even snoring quickly after his head hit the pillow.

_I'm hoping this all goes as well as Pepper says it should…_

* * *

And there you have it. A nice length chapter for the first new story of mine in a little under 2 years. Finally.

Hope it sets the pace of the story well enough. I'm trying to get a good balance in between the too many words and not enough WORDS, and Not enough words at all points. I hope I took all the constructive criticism I've received over the years and put it to good use finally. This will be, hopefully, a million times better than New beginnings ever was trying to be. Please, readers, Read and review this chapter, and tell me what you think needs to be done to make the next chapter better. It always makes me feel accomplished when a reader points out something relevant that I didn't notice in my own writing.

Anyway, I know you're not here to read the words I put to express my own thoughts outside the story you came to read. So enjoy this story, as much as I'll enjoy writing it now that life is back in the right shape it needs to be and I have free time. :D


	2. A change of Pace

Tenuto

Next chapter time. Let's just get to this.

* * *

Fox sighed as he paced in his room, constantly checking the clock despite the fact that the time hadn't changed much since his pacing started. 0700 was the time, according to the green numbers of the holoclock face. "Ugh. First I can't sleep well, and now it seems like time itself is telling me to screw off." He grumbled to himself, chewing on his lower lip again as was the nervous habit he had since his academy days. "Why can't launch time get here quicker?" He growled lowly, shaking his head as he sat back down on the edge of his bed.

"You know Fox, pacing isn't going to make it go by any faster, either." Peppy chuckled from the doorframe, causing Fox to jump in his skin a bit. "Sorry if I startled you, Fox. I'm kind of in the same situation too though." He smiled, sipping at a cup of tea held in his hands. "You sure about taking this mission, Fox?" the hare asked with an aside glance at the vulpine leader.

"I'm not really sure about the mission itself, no. Why would pepper ask for our help specifically instead of sending a different squad of subordinates out there? Unless there's something he's not telling us about that signal. In which case, this could turn from a good opportunity to something very bad." Fox sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "And more importantly, wasn't Orion base abandoned right after the Lylat war took place?"

"Mhm. That's been bothering me too. We haven't heard of anything happening from the Orion quarry on Fichina, and all of a sudden there's a distress signal? I've got a bad feeling that this is a trap Fox." The old lapine sighed, taking another sip of his tea. "If it is a trap, shouldn't we have the cruiser waiting in orbit for quick retreat?" He asked, sighing. This would be easier to plan if they still had the Great Fox.

"From what I gathered, they're just going to give the cruiser to us for missions anyway, so for the most part it's ours. At least until we get the Great Fox back to working condition. We'll work something out once we're out of Corneria's atmosphere and nearing Fichina. Hopefully this cruiser's warp drives aren't too bad." Fox mused, resting his chin on his hands as he went over possible escape plans in his head. No matter how hard he tried, though, there was still a sinking feeling in his gut. _There's no possible way this mission could just be a routine distress response._ He thought grimly.

"Well, whatever the case, it wouldn't hurt to leave someone in the cruiser to serve as a sort of anchor, right?" Peppy asked. Insight seemed to be a gift to the old hare, if his ability to plan was any indication. "That way we'd have someone in orbit to alert us if anything breached scanners or whatever happens."

"Yeah. I'm assuming that's your way of volunteering, huh Peppy?" Fox grinned, rolling his eyes at Peppy's chuckle and unassuming shrug. "Although we don't need three of us on the surface. I say you and Slippy stay on the cruiser and Falco and I will go to the surface. The two of us have better combat ability, and neither of us are cold blooded." He laughed. As sound as this plan seemed, he had to worry about something happening to the cruiser in orbit. There was always something bound to go wrong in these missions.

"Ah, that's actually a good idea, Fox." Peppy chuckled, giving an appreciative nod at the fact that he wouldn't have to go down to the icy planet. He sighed as he heard a loud groan a few rooms over, indicating Falco had woken and realized the massive hangover he was going to recover from. "Well, looks like Falco is up, and from the sounds of it, Slippy as well." He nodded solemnly as he looked at Fox's clock, chuckling as he saw the 0750 lit up on the holoclock.

"Huh, well that was fast." Fox sighed, laying back against his bed in a decidedly un-commanderly fashion. "Well, I guess I'll start getting ready, cause heaven knows Falco won't start getting ready until we're 10 minutes to launch." He grumbled, shaking his head at the falcon in his mind. _He'll be the death of me, that's for sure._ He rolled his eyes yet again as he stood up, making his way to the attached bathroom in the master bedroom of the suite.

As he stepped into the shower, letting the hot water run down his back, he let his thoughts wander. _There are so many ways this mission can go wrong, it's just unsettling. Not to mention that every simple mission we've been on usually ends in disaster. Knowing our luck it'll just be like that capture mission on Macbeth involving that so-called 'precious cargo'. Whatever. As long as Star Wolf doesn't show up like they usually do, we'll be a hell of a lot better off._ He sighed as he rinsed the soap off of his fur, finally turning the water off and stepping out to dry.

"Fox, ready to leave?" Slippy's voice called from behind the bathroom door. " It's 8:20. The spaceport is at least 15 minutes away." He explained, seeming a little too excited for someone who had trouble waking up before noon. He gave the toad a noncommittal response about being out in a minute. Fox ran a comb through his fur quickly and slid on his flight suit, tying the red scarf around his neck last before he left the room, making sure to grab his watch.

"Alright team, let's grab the cab and get to the Spaceport. Launch is in forty minutes. Don't want to be late, do we?" he grinned, doing his best to make some sort of pre-flight speech like they did in the academy.

* * *

Fox wasn't sure what to expect upon arriving at the Spaceport. Part of him expected a large banner saying "Welcome StarFox" or something equally ridiculous, but the normalcy of the place startled him. He shouldn't have expected anything different from the Green-Port, what with it being the rich sector, and the rich hardly left their houses for anything their personal servants could do for them. He sighed as he made his way to the small military sector within the spaceport, his team in tow. He made a note to make fun of Falco for getting himself into the hangover he had now. The falcon was staggering around slightly and groaning each time someone said something in his general direction. _Serves him right, for getting drunk right before the mission. _Fox chuckled to himself.

"Ah, team StarFox, it's a pleasure to be working with you. The _Aquilos_ will be here in a couple of minutes. We're sorry for the inconvenience. "A rather stout looking buck stated, adjusting his coat in an effort to appear busy. The roar of engines and the subtle whine of the G-Diffusers of various ships started to drown out any other words that the buck might have said. After a few hand gestures from the stout male, the crew found themselves winding through various corridors in a different area of the spaceport, where less noise reached the rooms. The large figure of the _Aquilos_ loomed in the viewports. It's rounded bulk looked far simpler than Fox had expected.

"That's the _Aquilos_?" Fox asked, sighing. He had expected something a bit more grandiose than this. The _Aquilos_ looked only slightly smaller than the Great Fox ever was. "It looks tiny." He grumbled, shaking his head as the buck led the crew to the loading bay for the cruiser. "Are you sure this thing can even hold our Arwings and a Landmaster?" Fox asked, raising a brow in question.

"Yes, we're sure it can, . The Arwings and the Landmaster are already in the ship's launch bay, and are ready for deployment at any time. Launch is in 30 minutes, please be ready by then." The buck stated rather curtly before turning on his heel and stalking away, presumably annoyed at the vulpine's disbelief. Fox rolled his eyes at the buck's retreating figure before another familiar face brought him out of his mental ranting.

"Ah, Fox. Glad to see you made it on time. I was afraid you'd be caught up with something the way Falco went out to the bars first thing after the ceremonial banquet was over." General Pepper chuckled as he made his way over to Fox, a smaller female cardinal following behind him. "Oh, I should probably introduce the two of you." He laughed, nodding to the cardinal. "This is Ms. Nadia Weber. She's-"

"Oh, She's the head of the CARD" Slippy spoke up suddenly, seeming proud of himself for knowing something useful for once.

"The CARD?" Fox asked, his head tilted in confusion. "What in the world is that?"

"It stands for Cornerian Advanced Research Division." The cardinal spoke up, chuckling. "Although I'm not surprised you haven't heard of the CARD. We tend to stick to low profiles." She smiled, shaking her head slightly. "The CARD is in charge of making substantial investigations into potentially world-changing experiments, all to further Corneria's knowledge of the unknown. It also deals with inventing new breakthroughs in technology for the better of the Cornerian Commonwealth." She explained, chuckling as Fox's expression of confusion only worsened.

"What's she's saying Fox, is that the CARD's job is to make sure that there is nothing that can surprise the Cornerian Military. It's their job to come up with some of the most ridiculous things just to improve Corneria's development." Slippy tried to help explaining, and seemed to succeed if Fox's nod was anything to go by.

"Uh-huh. So why exactly is she here with you then, General?" Fox asked, sighing. The sudden science lecture was causing his head to hurt.

"I wanted her to meet the legendary StarFox." General pepper chuckled. "Plus, she is almost directly responsible in designing the _Aquilos_ that you will be taking. It's a special cruiser." He grinned.

"What's so special about it? The Great Fox looked better, and might work better." Fox grumbled. To say he was displeased with the cruiser was an understatement.

"I'll have you know that everything on the _Aquilos_ is state of the art. From its shield generators, to its warp drives. You won't find anything like them on any other ship." The cardinal stated in a huff, regarding Fox with a displeased scowl.

"Fine fine, Sorry. So it might be state of the art, but how does it handle?" Fox asked with a defeated sigh. He clearly couldn't win this battle.

"Due to the use of automatic coordinate tracking, the _Aquilos_ is able to work with little to no user interaction. Just simply put in the coordinates and it'll take you there. Sort of like Autopilot on most cruisers. The only difference is the _Aquilos_ has only a .001 percent margin of error. So no suddenly de-warping in an atmosphere or asteroid field." Nadia explained, starting to walk towards the loading dock for the ship. "Now, I'd suggest you board and get ready for launch." She chuckled.

Fox rolled his eyes yet again, shaking his head as he walked up the boarding ramp to the bridge of the cruiser. Everything looked different, and it was a strange feeling when he paid attention to it. He took his spot in a rather normal seeming chair in the middle of the bridge, half-expecting the comfortable chair he had had back on the Great Fox. He sighed as he brought up the holopad for the coordinate controls, inputting the coordinates for Fichina and putting it away. "Alright, is everything ready for launch?" he asked Slippy, who was performing a systems check.

"All systems green, Fox." The toad replied, giving Fox a thumbs up as he took a spot near the radar monitor.

"Good, StarFox, prepare for launch. Our destination is Fichina. It shouldn't take us long to get there." He called out, partly out of tradition. He still had his doubts about how well this mission would end up going, but they were pushed aside as he heard the roar of the engines flaring to full strength as the ship was moved on a MagLev track to the launch area. The _Aquilos_ shot off into the atmosphere after it reached the end of the MagLev. "Alright, Peppy, prepare to warp. It'll only take about a day of warp travel to get to Fichina." He instructed, getting only a nod in response.

"Warp Drive initiating, coordinates locked, entering warpspace." Peppy announced methodically. It was odd not having their robot companion around to take care of the smaller details of the ship's running. "Alright, we're in warp, now we can relax and let the ship's autopilot take care of the rest." The old hare chuckled, turning in his seat to scrutinize the team's leader.

"Good, it seems like Falco could use some rest." Fox grinned, hearing the falcon's pained groan for the umpteenth time that day. He chuckled as the bird gave him the middle finger, or feather in this case. "Well, serves you right, Falco. Getting drunk right after a big banquet, and before a mission at that." Fox grinned, hearing Falco's annoyed grumble.

"yeah yeah, Fox. Bite me. I didn't even know there was a mission when I was out getting wasted." The bird scowled. "Besides, why didn't you call us after you got the mission details anyway? Then I wouldn't have this godawful hangover." Falco sighed, rubbing the bridge of his beak.

"Well, I would have, had you not stumbled into the hotel right after I got the mission specs from Pepper." Fox rolled his eyes at his teammate's scoff. He noticed he seemed to be rolling his eyes a lot more often than usual for some reason. _Gotta stop doing that. _He mentally told himself with a chuckle.

"Um, Fox. There's something you might want to look at." Slippy murmured from his station at the radar and systems analysis consoles.

"Huh, what is it Slip?" Fox asked, genuinely confused.

"Well, I did some analysis on the distress signal. Turns out, that General Pepper's analysis team was only half right. While the distress signal _is_ coming from Orion base, it isn't an Orion base distress signal. In fact, it's not a distress signal matching any in the Cornerian database. So I'm pretty sure it's some other distress signal, possibly Venomian, that we're responding to here." To be perfectly honest, Fox wasn't all that surprised.

"So you're saying-"

"It's a trap, most likely."

A sigh. Then an angry grumble from Fox. "Well, fuck." They were walking right into a trap. One probably set by Venomian remnants.

* * *

And there ends the second chapter, right on a rather decent cliffhanger too. :D Don't worry, the next chapter should be up soon. Also, I'm sorry if the pacing of the story seems a little slow, but it'll get right into the good stuff real soon. So stick with it. And as always, please, do review. Tell me if you notice something wrong, I won't try to hurt you if you do. It's criticism that's got me this far, and it's criticism that'll help me in the long run.

Until next time. See ya.


	3. It's quiet too quiet

Sforzando

New chapter time.

* * *

"Well fuck." Fox sighed, rubbing at his temples in irritation. He knew there was something Pepper wasn't telling him, but he didn't expect this. "See if you can isolate the specifics of the signal, Slip, and try to deduce whether it's Venomian or not. Once that gets done, then we can figure out what to do once we get to Fichina, because I'm pretty sure this ship won't stop until we get there." Fox ordered, worrying on his lower lip yet again.

"What do you mean we'll figure out what to do once we get there?! For all we know, we might get there and be shot at!" Falco yelled, before reflexively clutching his head, momentarily having forgotten about his hangover.

"Falco's got a point, Fox. We need to come up with a plan of action now instead of later. While we're still in warp, we can't do much anything else anyway. So, it'd be better to have an idea of what to do now." Peppy sighed, mentally scolding their leader's lack of immediate incentive.

"Fine fine, I get it. We need a plan now. Alright, Once we get into Fichinan airspace, I'll head out in the landmaster. Falco, you cover me in your arwing. Peppy, Slippy, you two are to stay with the _Aquilos_. Set the shields to the highest they'll go without routing power from any other subsystems." Fox commanded, biting back a sigh as he took a glance at the ETA to Fichinan airspace. Approximately 16 hours. It was quicker than he expected, but not enough time for him to relax either. "Falco, you _can_ fly your arwing right now, can't you?" He sighed, focusing a stern scowl at the falcon.

"Yeah, Foxie. I can. This hangover might be hurting, but I'm not drunk anymore. Don't worry. I ain't gonna shoot you on accident just because my head is hurting." Falco grumbled, muttering something that vaguely sounded like "_get off my back, jeez."_

Fox chuckled softly as he turned to make his way to wherever the hangar was located on the ship, deciding a check over their equipment was required. His heavy footsteps echoing in the empty corridors. He brought up the onboard schematics on his personal holopad that was installed into a module on the bracelet on his left arm, following the directions to the hangar bay. It was a much greater difference than the Great Fox, the hangar bay was on the middle levels of the ship, instead of the Great Fox's bottom level. Upon entering the hangar, he was met with the familiar sights of his and the crew's arwing, as well as the landmaster tank.

"Well, old pal, it's time to fly again, so soon after the last time, too." He chuckled, shaking his head, making his way to the landmaster. He rested his hand against the tank's hull. "We'll need ya, pal." He chuckled. _Look at me now, talking to the equipment. Either I'm going insane, or this is just an aftereffect of stress._ He mentally chuckled. He opened the hatch for the landmaster and slid into the pilots seat, a tighter fit than the cockpit of an arwing. The console panels and controls were dark, only set to light up when the tank was in use. He sighed, leaving the tank's cockpit as he checked his holopad again, this time for their ETA to Fichina. 15 hours. _Time really does pass slower when you're thinking about it, I guess._ Fox mentally sighed, deciding to take a better look around the cruiser.

* * *

"**Leaving warp space in approximately 15 minutes. All personnel please remain in a stable location, or risk physical shock.**" A robotic voice echoed around the rec-room of the _Aquilos_ where Fox was currently going through a simple workout to ease his mind. "**Repeat, leaving warp space in 15 minutes. All personnel please remain in a stable location, or risk physical shock.**" Fox shook his head slightly as he made his way to the launch bay, intending on being ready to launch in the landmaster upon leaving warp.

"This is Fox, coming in from the landmaster in the launch bay. I suggest everyone be ready for their roles in our plan. We don't know what we're up against, and we won't have time to think once we exit warp." Fox commanded over a commlink to the bridge of the ship. "So, that means you Falco. Get down here to your arwing and be ready to launch." His hands were already busy initiating the startup protocol of the landmaster. The screens in front of him hummed to life as they displayed vital information one by one. The last thing to start up was the view screen. The whole top of the inside of the landmaster lit up with a full panoramic view of the launch bay. Beside him he could faintly hear the dull whine of Falco's arwing's G-diffuser's starting up.

"**Incoming transmission from an unknown location.**" The robotic voice of the ship rang in Fox's communicator, a notification popping up on Fox's scouter.

"Patch them through." Fox answered simply, wincing when he was met by a loud burst of static.

"Who is…state…busin…warp sig…" A voice spoke, though there was too much interference to make out anything important.

"Slippy, get a lock on the transmission and work to amplify it, I'm getting a ton of interference in the signal, can't even understand what's being said." Fox ordered quickly, tapping his fingers on an empty space in the landmaster, forced to wait.

"**Exiting warp space. You have arrived at Fichinan airspace.**" The ship announced, thoroughly unaffected by the goings on of its crew, much to Fox's displeasure. _Why couldn't they have programmed some sort of awareness module into that stupid thing, anyway? It would make things a little more bearable around here. _Fox mused to himself, rubbing his temple to ward off a headache.

"Who is this? State your business being here with an unidentified warp signature." A voice came in over Fox's headset, startling him at the sudden intrusion upon his thoughts.

"This is Fox McCloud, of team StarFox. We are here about a distress signal from Orion base. Who the hell are you?" Fox answered, slightly confused. _Wasn't the Orion base supposed to be abandoned? Then why was there a direct commlink from the general coordinates of Orion base? This isn't making any sense. Is this another thing Pepper forgot to mention to us?_ Fox mentally growled, his thoughts confusing him more.

"McCloud? Of _the_ StarFox? What the hell? We don't ever remember sending out a distress signal, let alone from Orion base." The voice murmured, sighing as it seemed to start a conversation with someone else on the other side of the comm. link.

"We'll be coming down with a landmaster and an arwing." Fox stated simply as he set the comm. link to mute for the dual-band signal. "Slippy, how's it looking down there?" He asked over a secondary link.

"Not looking good, There are ships even in the launch space that are firing at each other. Seems like a civil war is going on or something. I can't tell which ships are which." Slippy explained, letting out another heavy sigh.

"It seems more likely that it'd be a civil war. There have been rumors of Fichinan workers going on strike more often. But it still shouldn't have gotten to the point that civil war would be necessary." This time Peppy spoke up, his explanation making Fox sigh yet again.

"uh-huh. Fine. Launch the landmaster and the arwing. Hopefully they'll be too busy with each other to notice us." Fox sighed, feeling the landmaster jolt as it was brought into a atmospheric entry pod. He gripped the controls of the landmaster's boost system and braced himself. The catapult launched the landmaster out of the hangar and into the recesses of space on a direct course to the surface of Fichina. He groaned momentarily as the G-Diffusers on the landmaster kicked in, dispersing the G-force throughout the entire vehicle, and finally relieving the pressure on its pilot.

"Good thing they're too preoccupied with each other to attack us, Fox." Falco's voice came over as the atmospheric entry capsule around the landmaster started to rumble due to hitting the atmosphere and using bow-installed thrusters to make its content's landing a little easier. "I guess that makes part of our mission a little easier. But damn. For Pepper to throw us into this in the middle of a civil war… He probably knew about it too, just sending us in to try to fix it, I'm sure.

"That's enough, Falco. We'll have a talk with General Pepper after we're done here. Right now, just focus on staying out of the crossfire." Fox sighed, gripping the controls of the landmaster again as he felt it slow down, before being jostled by the landing. The capsule split apart, allowing Fox to drive the landmaster off of it and onto the snow covered ground of Fichina. "Alright, Peppy, can you upload a nav-link location for Orion base from our position?" Fox's request was met with an almost immediate response, as the simple navigation settings in the landmaster showed that the aforementioned base was only about 30 parsecs to the northeast. "Alright, landmaster, heading to destination. Falco, you got the airspace covered? There are no threats in the air, correct?"

"That's right, Fox. It's all empty here. Seems like most of the battles of the Civil war are between the frigates, surprisingly." Falco replied over the voice-only link. "It's kind of uncomfortable, knowing that there aren't any infantry troops or any ground battles. You'd think they'd be trying to take ground."

"Yeah, that's bothering me too. We'll play that one by ear though. Right now, we need to keep going. Northeast. Head out." Fox nodded, closing the comm. link and pushing the throttle forward, turning the landmaster to the appropriate direction and setting it on the simple autopilot it came with. He decided to do a quick survey of the area, using the landmaster's turret mounted cameras, yet all he was met with was the bleak whiteness of Fichina. _I've got a bad feeling about this. It can't be a civil war. There aren't any infantry units or even sub-atmospheric combat. And I know they have fighters, we've had to deal with a lot of them back in the Lylat wars. _ He was broken out of his thoughts with a rather steady beeping. It was his comm.-notifier, telling him he had a signal trying to establish a link with him. "This is Fox."

"McCloud, I see you've made it to the surface. Good. They haven't targeted you." The same voice from in the hangar bay remarked with a relieved sigh.

"They? Who the hell are they?" Fox asked, starting to get irritated by the other speaker's deliberate vagueness.

"Well, I was going to explain to you what was going on before you cut me off and entered atmosphere. You saw the cruisers in space, right? Well, only one of those was Fichinan. The other was a ship that had been infected with a rogue A.I program. Ever since the Cornerian Commonwealth Bureau tried to implement these A.I to make working in the Fichinan quarries easier, they've been on a rampage. Something about some rogue programming gone wrong, or infected with some sort of virus. And I'm assuming that's what the distress signal from Orion base is coming from."The voice explained, causing Fox to sigh yet again and bite his lower lip. _So it was a trap. But not from venom? Then what about that Venomian signal Slippy found? Is that just a trick, or was it due to an A.I virus as well? _"-ould use your help." Was all Fox heard after he zoned out to his thoughts.

"What? So it's all an A.I, not Venom? Cause the distress signal we were receiving wasn't Orion base itself, but only in the general location, and that signal was a Venomian distress signal. Are you sure you've got the right information? Who are you anyway?" Fox scowled at his scouter, due to a lack of objects to direct his ire to.

"I am Sergeant Jason Polk, sir. Leader of this sector of the Fichinan military." He responded, before chatter on the other side of the link caused him to have to stop a moment.

"Uh-huh. Listen, I and another of my crewman are en route to Orion base. If there's anything you need to know for when we get there we will contact you. McCloud out." Fox sighed, quickly cutting the link before the young sounding sergeant could continue. He wasn't in the mood to deal with authority right now.

A few moments after the revealing conversation, Fox's nav-link let out a beep, signaling arrival at the destination. A quick scan with the landmaster's turret revealed absolutely nothing substantial, just more of the expanse of whiteness, much to Fox's dismay. "Alright, Falco, Make your landing and we'll enter the base on foot." Fox instructed, opening the hatch to the landmaster and making sure his trusty blaster was at his hip and hoping he didn't have to use it.

"Gotcha, Fox. Coming in for a landing, watch your head." Falco called cheerily. _Seems like his hangover is gone._ Fox thought dryly, shaking his head at his teammate's antics. He started towards the base, drawing his blaster just for good measure.

As they stepped into the base, Fox noticed the lights were all off. _Funny, if this base was just in use, why are there no lights, and even if the power had gone off, there is always an emergency generator. Something isn't right. _Fox turned to Falco, exchanging hand signals between them. '_**lights off, not right, stay quiet.**_' He communicated, turning the nearest corner and continuing down the long corridors to the center of the base, where the main consoles were located.

Fox crept on his toes, part of him wishing his boot's weren't steel-toed at the moment, as he worked to be as quiet as possible, despite the obvious signs that no one had been inhabiting this base for quite some time. _Okay, this is just getting creepy. I would understand if there were enemies lying in ambush, but even then there'd be telltale signs, but this just looks like it's never been touched at all in years. That bad feeling I had is only getting worse._ Fox grumbled in his mind as he checked around a corner that was supposed to lead to the central room. He expected more of nothing, but what he got was a much more surprising sight.

"Well well," came a familiar voice from the central room, followed by a hollow coughing. "Look what the cat dragged in."

"What are you doing- What is _he_ doing here?!" Falco exclaimed, but Fox barely heard him. His gaze was trapped by the figure before him.

"Long time no see," Another coughing fit. "Fox."

"Wolf…"

* * *

Again, cliffhangers. Aren't I bad? Heh. This was kind of a hard chapter to get out, because, right in the middle of it, writers block wanted to come back, but I beat it again. And here we are. Hope you guys enjoy, and as always, Reviews are like the elixir of life to me. Tell me your thoughts, and if you don't like some of the things I've done, tell me.


	4. Reflections

Teneramente

Don't own this stuff, sorry.

Thanks to the reviews so far, they do help me to know when people are reading my works. So thanks everybody.

New chapter time!

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"Wolf…" Fox growled lowly, eyes narrowing at the lupine figure in his vision. _And yet again, StarWolf shows up and makes everything infinitely more complicated._ "Where's your little gang? They gonna come out and ambush us from behind? That's low, even for you." Fox spat, glaring daggers at the lupine. Falco apparently had different thoughts, pulling his blaster out and aiming at Wolf, pulling the trigger. He barely had time to register what happened before he was forced to dodge his own blue energy bolt, reflected from the violet reflector shield surrounding Wolf.

"Now now, birdbrain; don't ya know that it's not a good idea ta attack an unarmed opponent?" Wolf chuckled, making an effort to stand. He raised his hands in the universal surrender gesture, making no reach for his weapons.

"Falco, don't attack recklessly. Didn't you already forget our only real rule? Only attack when attacked yourself." Fox chided, sighing.

"But this is Wolf we're talking about. The one who tried to kill you, multiple times mind you." Falco grumbled, keeping his blaster trained on the lupine. "Why should we follow that stupid rule if we know he's going to try to kill you again?!"

"What if I said I wasn't here to kill either of you morons? And that I've kind of been holed up here for the past few weeks. No matter how you look at it, I'm in no shape to attack two of the best mercenaries Corneria can employ." Wolf shook his head, sighing. "It's kinda sad, actually, that I can't beat the two of ya into a nice bloody mess." Wolf chuckled, shrugging nonchalantly.

"Yeah yeah, fuzzball, laugh it up while you still can. There's still two of us and one of you." Falco grumbled, gripping the handle of his blaster a bit tighter than before. "So don't get any funny ideas or nothing."

"Oh, I'm well aware that, between the two of you, I'm outmatched, but that's not really a good idea for you to attack me anyway, cause that's no way to repay the guy who technically saved your lives." Wolf smirked in his insufferable 'know-it-all' way. Fox sighed as he rubbed his temple to ward off the annoyance again.

"Both of you just shut up." Fox snapped, grumbling to himself. "It's really not helping either of your cases to keep arguing like this." He sighed. "What the hell are you doing here anyway, Wolf? And why shouldn't we shoot you?"

"I'm only here due to circumstance. I came here on a covert mission from the CSB, after we saved your asses from tha' aparoids. I guess they just desperately needed some scapegoat or some shit, cause no sooner than I started this mission did all hell break loose and the A.I of most of the bases go AWOL and I end up stuck here because they ended up stealing my Wolfen." Wolf sighed, his tail twitching behind him irritably. "Fuckin' assholes, that thing cost me a fortune to keep up to date." He scowled, glowering at the floor for good measure.

"Why are you telling us this crap, fuzzball? What have you got to gain by telling us your life story anyway?" Falco shot the lupine a glare.

"Hey hey hey, stop it Falco. He might have nothing to gain from telling us this, but I'm pretty sure he'd have nothing to gain by lying to us, especially not with two blasters trained on him. But Falco does have a good point, why the hell _are_ you telling us this?" Fox scowled, thoroughly confused to his rival's motives.

"Because, like you said, Mercenary Rule 1: Do not attack unless attacked first. And also because I'm on a mission from the Cornerian Security Bureau, and I'm assuming you're on a similar mission, most likely from that General everyone looks up to." Wolf rolled his eye, lavender meeting emerald in an amused grin.

"Uh, well, yeah actually. General Pepper sent us here due to a signal from this base. That was you?" Fox dropped his blaster, puzzlement apparent on his face. "That would explain why it was Venomian." He shrugged, sighing as he rubbed the bridge of his nose again out of habit.

"Signal? As in distress signal? Why tha' hell would I need to use one of those?" Wolf grumbled. "I'm perfectly capable of holding my own."

"Well, we're not sure either, to be fair. So you didn't send out a distress signal at all? Not even by, say, biotic implant subsystems?" Fox asked, eyebrow cocked in confusion. This was all starting to make even less sense than before.

"No. My implant isn't designed to suddenly broadcast distress signals for any reason. Hell, it's just an ocular implant, not some farfetched supercomputer." Wolf sighed, staring at Fox with an amused expression at the other's superfluous thought process. "Although those stupid A.I bots might have pushed something in my Wolfen when they fuckin' hijacked the thing." Wolf grumbled, physically wincing at the mention of having his prized ship stolen.

"Huh. Seems likely enough." Fox grumbled, idly tapping his chin in thought. "Although that would explain a portion of it, what I don't get is why it's been broadcasting a signal for a few days now."

"Huh? Days? But the signal shouldn't persist for days unless it's being maintained, otherwise It's supposed ta stop itself after a few hours." Wolf mused, leaning against a nearby wall with a grunt. "Stupid fuckin' A.I bastards." He snarled, glaring determinedly at a spot on the ground.

"Huh. Well, I've got an idea then. Wolf works with us, and when we're done with our respective missions, we can all go our merry ways." Fox sighed, shooting Falco a pointed _don't-say-anything_ glare. Pulling the bird aside, he spoke in a whisper. "That way, we have his strengths on our side, and we can get more information. That Jacob Polk guy I don't trust, and I'm sure we'll need Wolf for something. And if he decides to attack us, we've got the Great Fox in orbit, we can just take care of him then, it'd be 4 on 1." Fox explained, ignoring Falco's scoffs of irritation. "Plus, we do kind of owe him for helping us defeat the Aparoid queen." Fox sighed.

"Fine fine, I get it, He saved our lives and now we have to do something nice for him just because." Falco growled, tapping his foot impatiently. "Whatever, just whatever needs to be done. As long as his little lizard buddy isn't around, I'll be much better off."

"Alright. Wolf, we'll help you get your Wolfen back, but in return, you're going to have to work with us while we're here." Fox explained. Wolf's expression was priceless, a mix of confusion and surprise, with a hint of doubt thrown in. Fox chuckled slightly. "And don't worry. No strings attached." He nodded, putting his blaster back in its holster at his hip.

"Really now? And why would the _great star fox_ need to help poor me?" Wolf sighed, pushing off from the wall he was leaning against casually. "Not like I really need your help, but there's more of those robot fuckers out there, and I'm pretty sure I'm not in the right state of being to take on more than a few." Wolf grumbled, rubbing his shoulder slightly, stepping over to the main computer console in the room.

"Yeah, sure. Fuzzball can't even admit when he needs help." Falco sneered, twirling his blaster on a finger before holstering it with a chuckle. "It's okay; we can take them out no matter what. We've got the landmaster outside just waiting for them." He grinned.

"You have a what now?" Wolf grumbled, clearly confused. "The hell is a landmaster?" He frowned, an ear twitching in aggravation.

"It's a tank, essentially. The specifics aren't important, what's important is that we get moving ASAP." Fox chuckled, shaking his head with a grin. "Come on." He motioned for Wolf and Falco to follow him out. He heard Wolf mutter a few choice words under his breath again, something about how he ended up in these situations.

They made their way to the entrance, shielding their eyes from Solar's reflection off the sheer white snow on the ground. Fox let out a sigh when his eyes finally adjusted from the dank darkness of the inside of the base. "Damn. It's fuckin' bright out here." He heard wolf curse with a growl.

"Tha's for sure." Falco muttered, scowling. "It wasn't this bright when we got here, was it?" He turned to Fox, sighing.

"You know, it really wasn't. Something must be up." Fox tapped his chin as he watched Falco move to get into his Arwing, starting it up and initiating the launch mechanics, which left Wolf with Fox, much to the latter's displeasure. "Ugh, and of course he goes to leave me here." He muttered to himself. "Alright Wolf, we'll have to get in the Landmaster. The Great Fox is up in orbit, and we can work on finding your Wolfen from there." He sighed.

"You want me to go up there on _your_ ship? Just to try to get mine back?" Wolf scowled, raising a brow at the ridiculous suggestion.

"Well what do you suggest? Just wandering around here to find your ship? Or do you want to stay here and just wait for it to magically appear again?" Fox sighed, he was getting real tired of everyone asking stupid questions.

"Well…" Wolf trailed off, before closing his mouth before anything else could be said. "Fine. You win that one." He scowled, following Fox to the landmaster as the vulpine got in, motioning Wolf in after. "What? You think I should get in there? With you?" he asked, deadpan. "you're kidding, right?"

"Unless you want to deal with the cold out there, then yes." Fox sighed, leveling his gaze on the lupine. "So, There's enough room in here for you to not have to be cramped, and we can make our way to the _Aquilos_." Fox explained, biting back a snarky remark as Wolf lowered himself into the landmaster.

"Fox. Come in. This is Peppy. We've got some unpleasant news for ya. We're noticing a huge wave of what looks to be ion-clouds heading the direction of your launch area. It might be a blizzard or something, so hurry back to the ship so you don't get caught in it." Peppy stated, obviously worried.

"We'll try, but with the landmaster, we can't guarantee much. We'd need to find a safe area for the _Aquilos _to come into the atmosphere. Cause, you know, the landmaster can't really get us into space now, can it." Fox resisted the urge to slap his palm against his forehead from the momentary lack of common sense, even from the old hare.

"Oh. Whoops. Forgot all about that. I guess I'm so used to you taking your arwing out instead of the landmaster. Alright, Contact us when you have a clear location for pickup, Fox. Peppy out." The hare's comm. link clicked to signal the disconnection.

"And sometimes I'm surrounded by a lack of common sense." He muttered to himself.

"I wouldn't say completely surrounded, I'm here, aren't I?" Wolf grinned from his spot behind the pilot's chair.

"Like I said, Surrounded by idiots." Fox rolled his eyes, pressing the ignition switch for the landmaster and starting the tank up. He pushed the throttle controls forward, sending the landmaster across the snowy fields, sighing as he resigned himself to his present company and searching for an open area, trying to be wary of the storm that was said to be moving his way. _Dammit peppy, why couldn't you have told me which direction it was coming from?_ He scowled, biting on his lower lip again.

"Hey, I'm no idiot, pup." Wolf growled, scowling dejectedly at a random spot on the control panels.

"yeah yeah, now's not the time to worry about that." Fox scolded, momentarily letting himself chuckle inwardly at the current situation; scolding his rival like a child at his pouting. "You can pout later, we need to get away from the incoming storm, wherever it may be."

"I ain't poutin'. No fuckin' way." Wolf scowled, looking all the more like a dejected and scolded child.

Fox rolled his eyes, turning to give Wolf a quick scowl and pulled quickly back off the throttle, sending Wolf jolting about in the cockpit. He didn't expect what was next.

"Uh. Pup. Is that…?" Wolf asked, pointing at the view screen of the frontal cameras.

"Is what..? Oooooohhh. That. Yeah." Fox's expression fell from a cocky smirk to a look of shock and despair. The current whall of white and blue was not a very welcoming sight.

"Well…son of a bitch."

"You can say that again."

* * *

I am very sorry you guys that this took so long to get out. I kept getting distracted, but that's an excuse and I shouldn't be making those. Hope you enjoy this new chapter. Sorry if you were expecting it to be a lot more action filled or something and if you were disappointed it was mostly sort of fluff between Fox and Wolf, but I've got my plans, and I just kind of wanted the end of this to be a wham episode. All "Whoo, we're getting along, and then suddenly "Bam. Blizzard." I also kind of ended up just going off on tangents and whatnot cause I just kind of had those bubbles of "Can't figure out where to go." I'll try not to keep you guys waiting this long between my next chapters.

続く


	5. Understandings

Allargando

Sorry about the wait my faithful readers, Writers block is a pain. I had a lot of this wrote out beforehand, but I just didn't like how it felt. So, without further ado, enjoy the newest chapter.

* * *

"Well…son of a bitch."

"You can say that again." Fox growled as the ion blizzard moved closer and closer to the landmaster. Fox gripped the control and put on the brakes on the right side of the tank and quickly forcing the left side booster to overdrive to quickly turn the tank around to an about-face.

"Son of a… Warn me next time you do something like that!" Wolf snarled, rubbing the back of his head as he had hit it upon one of the walls of the landmaster. "Though it looks like it's coming in too fast, there's no way we can escape this." Wolf growled, tapping a few things into his wrist-mounted command-pad, as his Implant lit up. "Unless you can ramp this thing up to at least 35 more knots of speed, we'll be caught in that storm. And I highly doubt that this thing was meant to be a skirmisher. So we're essentially fucked." Wolf sighed, shaking his head.

"Shut up, Wolf. I don't need your input or I would have asked for it." Fox sighed, pushing the thrusters as fast as they would go. Unfortunately it wasn't enough, a glance behind them would reveal that the storm was catching up with them faster than they could go. "You're kidding, right?" Fox growled. "Wolf, check our rations, they'll be right beside you on the canopy."

"Really pup? You're asking me to check something for ya? Your rival having access to your rations?" Wolf chuckled as he turned to grab the bag of rations, portioning it out in practiced motions.

"Currently you're stuck with me in here until this blows over, so those are our rations, not just mine." Fox glared at wolf, pushing the thruster further, in a vain attempt to add more speed. He yelped as the ship shook, and the external cameras went white. The blizzard had caught up to them.

"Well shiiiit." Wolf sighed, in his slight drawl. He rubbed the back of his head again as he had hit another corner in the cockpit. "And dammit Fox, stop making me hit my head against shit." Wolf growled, rubbing the bump on his head.

"How in the world is that my fault?" Fox sighed, grumbling as the landmaster was rocked by a strong gust of wind from the blizzard, before a loud thunk resonated through the cabin.

"The hell was that?" Wolf scowled, scrambling to his feet, pressing a button to pull up the transpari-steel cockpit view, allowing a full view of their surroundings, before his face fell as he noticed the rather interesting landing the landmaster had made as it had been rolled over, and then stuck in a good 10 feet of snow. "Well shit. Looks like we're stuck here until this storm runs over. Fuck." He growled.

"Oh great. It's bad enough being stuck here by myself. But with you?" Fox muttered to himself, scowling as he clicked a button, bringing all the consoles and viewscreens back up, taking a look at the battery and gas tank gauges. "ugh, at least we'll have some gas to use to keep ourselves warm." He finished to himself, sighing as he resigned himself to his current situation. He worked stubbornly to force himself to ignore wolf's presence behind him in the small space as he went about trying to pick up on any available broadcast signals that may have been left untouched by the electrical shitstorm that they were currently stuck in, and to no avail on either front of his new self-assigned task.

"hm, So that's why they're called Ion blizzards." Wolf spoke up suddenly, causing Fox to jump in his seat. "I completely forgot the whole, and I may be a little off here mister technical, frying of weak electronics and signals." Wolf finished sardonically, rolling his good eye in the light of the screens in the landmaster.

"Shut it Wolf, I don't need your sarcasm." Fox scowled, grumbling something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like "mangy dogbreath" prompting Wolf to chuckle to himself as he leaned back against the paneling of the tank. "It'd still be worth trying to see if we could catch onto a wide-broadcast signal from somewhere. If we can get it to the Aquila then they would be able to figure out our location, even if it is just a minor blip on the radar." Fox explained, scowling as he realized that the blizzard was just too strong and there weren't any live signals in this storm.

* * *

"Fox. Come in Fox. Do you read me?" Peppy called over the private-area signal that they had previously been contacting their leader. It had been some time since his last broadcast, and Peppy hoped that he hadn't been caught in the large blizzard that had been close by his location. "Come in Fox. Do you read?" He continued, despite Falco's insistence that he had been caught in the storm most likely.

"You'll probably not get him old man. As far as the radars are putting out, all the major radio waves are caught going directly through that ionic storm." Falco scowled, sighing as he pressed a few keys on the console of the unfamiliar desktop on the bridge of the Aquila. "For cripes sake, just stop trying. Even with Slippy amplifying the broadcast there's no response. He probably got caught in there." Falco sighed, shaking his head. "Though he was last in the Landmaster with his last transmission; I hope he made it back to the base before the blizzard hit." He scowled.

"I sure hope so. Lord knows what he'll do if he can't get back to his bed for the night." Peppy chuckled. "Remember the last time he was stuck on planet without his old bed?" He laughed, grinning widely when he saw Falco and Slippy grin and nod in response. He sighed slightly and set the radio frequency to a constant broadcast. He turned to his teammates and chuckled as they all started reliving stories of the past, and caught up on their times away from the team before the recent split up.

* * *

"Sir; we have an incoming transmission from the research lab on Fichinia. They say that the StarFox team has made contact. They mentioned that they were there on a sudden distress signal." A small fennec fox stated, sighing as he put down the earpiece as it started blaring static. "And there goes the signal by what can be presumed to be a blizzard." He growled to himself.

"Good. Good." A deep coarse voice echoed through the briefing room with a chuckle. "Now it's only a matter of time." He grinned, before muttering a curse under his breath as the communications relay beeped with an incoming transmission, which he patched through.

"Ah, Lady Hillgate, it's a pleasure to hear from you. How is your floristry business going?" He asked with a chuckle.

"Well enough, no thanks to your grubby hands. I've got one of your boys here who said he needed to talk to you and had not wanted the Zonessian emissary to notice the strange communication." The lithe tigress on the screen sighed, shaking her head.

"Fine, Patch him through a different channel then, you didn't need to contact me yourself, milady." The white furred raccoon sighed. "Which one is it?" He growled lowly.

"Sir, this is Lieutenant Jamieson. I've got reports on the shipments that came in for that growing rebellious sect of companies. They're calling themselves Leviathan's Talon." The graying husky sighed and shook his head. "They just got a supplement of Crylleium, and a few hundred kilos by the look of it." The husky nodded, looking down to type a few numbers into his datapad. "By the calculations, if they started producing anything with that much ore, we'd have a hard time keeping them in check."

"Really now? They're getting shipments of Crylleium? What do they expect to do with it really? Crylleium is, to the public, only a really pretty crystal. It's not like the commonwealth will know it's true purpose. Jamieson, do a more thorough investigation. If this 'Leviathan's Talon' is aware of that ore's true purpose, then there's a lot deeper mystery on our hands than just a few rogue union businesses." The racoon growled lowly, massaging the bridge of his muzzle to supress a headache.

"Yes Sir. I'll look deeper into Leviathan's Talon. I hope to be able to report back in a month. Jamieson, out." With his last words, the holo-screen went blank and the racoon sighed.

"That is very problematic indeed, though. A rebel group with access to Crylleium. They can't be up to anything good.

* * *

Fox sighed as he tapped on the siding of the inside of the landmaster. "You know Wolf, Last time we were this close and weren't trying to kill each other was over 20 years ago." he chuckled slightly as that memory popped into his head.

"Yeah, back before this whole Andross thing. before even the lylat war." the lupine chuckled slightly, shaking his head. "Hell, I even had both my eyes back then." He grinned fondly at the memory of when he and Fox were younger. "It makes me wish we could just go back to when things were much simpler." Wolf sighed, brows creasing in what seemed to be displeasure.

"I doubt it'd do us much good. Back then we weren't too far from where we are now. Instead of trying to kill each other, we were just trying to beat the other senseless." Fox smiled sadly. "Either way, we're stuck here now." He shrugged, frowning slightly at the expanse of white in the landmaster's monitor.

"Yeah, and keep up that tapping and I'll kill ya right here." Wolf scowled, but his facade didn't last long before a slight grin overtook his features as he realized his situation. "We really are just bigger more violent kids, aren't we pup?" He chuckled.

"Even so, we're 'bigger kids' in the middle of a damned snowstorm with no way to get into contact with anyone. and no end in sight on the snowstorm's behalf either." Fox huffed, pouting a little at the screen. "But still, I'd rather we not kill each other in such a small space, anyway. if one of us dies, the other has to deal with the body." he chuckled. Wolf smiled and joined Fox in his laughter, shaking his head.

"Ain't that the truth, I'd rather not deal with your dead body. I'd much prefer you alive, pup." Wolf chuckled.

"Same goes for you Wolf. We won't die here." Fox smiled and nodded confidently at his rival.

* * *

And there's the end of part one of this little saga. if the slightly fluffy seeming ending has no meaning to you, just look at the picture I used for this story. I do just about everything I do for a reason guys. and sorry for keeping you all in the dark so long, I just couldn't find the time to finish this chapter. I was so close to being done for so long, and then bam. I worked 22 days in a row. 3 damn weeks and not a single day off. so, I hope this makes up for it, and expect another chapter in hopefully a few weeks, if not sooner. I'll be trying hard to get back up to where I wanted to be on this fic.

anyways, enough of my problematic ranting. and as always:

read. review. refer.


	6. Revolution

Part 2: Chapter 1: Marcato

And here's the next chapter in this saga. I don't even know how many more chapters I'll be making here, this is starting to pan out more and more in my head, and I'm getting a lot of ideas that may or may not be implemented in this story. Regardless, on with the show.

* * *

"Sir. We still have not heard from Star Fox about the distress signal." A somewhat small beagle reported to the room of General Pepper. "It's been a week now. We should send a company out to check on them."

"This is problematic, for sure. Before we go sending any more of our own men out and thin Corneria's defense line, Attempt to make radio communication with them. They may still be doing covert investigations." General Pepper ordered as he turned on his heel to gaze at the Cornerian skyline. "I'll be down to communications in a moment, please prepare the link for me." The beagle nodded and saluted; turning and quickly walking out the door. Pepper sighed to himself as he walked closer to the window, hands in his pockets.

"This could get really difficult to keep under control. First Fox goes missing on an assignment for a week, and now the Cornerian commonwealth is starting to unify in what seems to be a rebellion. Someone must be setting this up, and I don't have my team of investigators to do anything about it." Pepper muttered to himself. He sighed as he paced back and forth in his office, before putting on his coat and striding through the door to go to the communications room. He came upon the door to the comm room and sighed, steeling himself for whatever information he may receive.

* * *

Fox growled as he looked around the white expanse of Fichina, shaking his head. They had escaped the storm a few days ago, but the sheer length of the storm had meant the Landmaster had run out of fuel and their communications equipment had all run out. He was sure that his team was looking for him. He jumped a bit as he heard the gruff voice of Wolf behind him. "You know, growling at it won't make it easier to find anything." Wolf chuckled as he started off in a direction that he had remembered one of the abandoned bases. "We've still got a few klicks to go until we get to one of those abandoned bases." Wolf laughed as he started trudging along through the deep snow. Fox simply scowled after him as he followed.

"Well, it might not do anything about us finding anything, but it sure makes me feel better." Fox laughed and smiled slightly as he watched wolf's retreating form. He sighed as he checked his wrist-comm, finding that signals were still jammed by something, probably one of the abandoned bases that was still broadcasting the planet wide radio signal. "Plus our communication signals are completely jammed, we can't get into contact with anyone anyway." Fox scowled.

"Well, communications or not, we need to make it to the nearby comm base, it's just a few klicks until we get there so stop your complaining." Wolf sighed and shook his head as he continued his trek through the heavy snowdrifts. He tapped a few things in on his wristpad, and suddenly changed direction, receiving a direct topographical overlay into his eyepiece. "It's this direction, hurry up or we'll freeze to death." Wolf growled.

"Shut up Wolf, I'm well aware." Fox grumbled, shaking his head as he brushed a bit of snow out of the fur of his face. "I wonder how the team is doing."

* * *

"What are we doing here on the planet again?" Slippy asked and sighed, glaring a bit at the flurries of snow as he, Peppy, and Falco trudged through the snowdrifts near the base the _Aquila _had landed at. "All I can remember is something about rogue AI, and needing a few capacitors for the shield generator. So we're here trudging along in the snow while Fox is still out there in the cold, The Landmaster is probably out of fuel, and I'm sure Fox doesn't know how to get somewhere he can stay safe." Slippy shook his head, sighing.

"Because, if we help these people, maybe they can lend some spare parts for us to boost our broadcast signal," Peppy explained shaking his head as he tightened his grip on the blaster rifle he was currently holding. "and then we could also use some parts to upgrade the radar on the _Aquila_. So if helping these people would help us find Fox, I'll do whatever I can."

"Yeah, and even if we can't get much help from them, at least this will distract us just enough from the already futile search for Fox, so either way we would have been sitting around doing nothing." Falco sighed, twirling the pair of E-295 blaster pistols he carried in his hands idly as the toad pressed a few buttons on the datapad he carried and sighed.

"Well, from this extrapolation data, it seems one of the parts they need is going to be in an abandoned base over this way. Shouldn't be too much trouble to find, literally a few kilometers away." Slippy said, resigning himself to his helplessness to do anything about finding Fox. "I mean, I guess you two are right. This might be better for finding Fox then." He sighed and shook his head.

* * *

"Senator Villes, we have news that might interest you." A large white furred tiger grinned slightly as he sat at the round table in the meeting room, the lush white sand beaches of Zoness setting the backdrop for the current senate meeting.

"Oh really, Chancellor Duscint? What might this information be then?" The small cardinal raised a brow as she shifted in her seat. If Duscint had found this news interesting, she might be able to do something with it. She had already had a hard time keeping her place as Senator, due to more than a few media bigwigs doing their best to make her seem the villain of Zoness' commonwealth.

"I hear that there is a Cornerian ship stationed around Fichina." The tiger explained, shrugging as if he were talking about the weather.

"Just a single ship?" Villes asked, brows raised high in confusion.

"Just one. I assume that they're there to scout out potential research bases. There had been recent rumors of Cryllieum deposits deep in caves on the planet, and Corneria could do a lot of things with that ore." The tiger smirked, the tip of his tail twitching a bit as he watched the Cardinal's face change to one of worry, then shock as the thought finished processing in her head.

"Oh gods. They could easily be more powerful than Andross' fleet during the Lylatian war. If Corneria were to actually attempt to use that power…" She trailed off with a shudder. "I dread to think of the possibilities further." She shook her head.

"Yes, but I don't think they are entirely aware of the sheer potential of Fichina. Although it might just be a good idea to send a research vessel with a small guard platoon with them as bodyguards, just to interfere with their search. If we can keep Corneria from gaining such power, maybe the balance of power would shift to our favor again. Zoness shall be a powerful planet once more, if we can manage this just right." The tiger chuckled lowly, grinning widely as he watched the cardinal nod her head slowly.

"That's a wonderful idea. Send Squadron Zeta out with Research team 7." The cardinal said, nodding slowly and speaking slower, eyes glazing over a bit as she looked out at the window to the beaches of Zoness. "Zoness shall rise to power once again." She murmured, almost as if in a trance.

"Good. Thank you for your consideration, milady." The tiger grinned maliciously as he closed the small PDA in his hands under the table. "I'll take my leave, if you don't mind, and leave you to your thoughts." He chuckled softly as he stood, sneaking the PDA back into his pocket as he left the meeting room. _That went just as well as expected, I've got to thank that man from _Leviathan's Talon_ for this wonderful little device. _He thought to himself. He smirked as he pulled out a phone from his pocket and pressed the dial pad, before putting it to his ear. "Hello, Mr. A. Yes, This is Duscint. The plan is in motion now. All that's left is to take care of that pesky Janus in the LSF. Yes, then we can bring you back into power from your throne."

"Yes. The sooner we can get Janus off our backs, the sooner we can get back to our fun little experiments down here. Now, don't call me again until step two is complete." The phone clicked as the voice on the other side of the line hung up. The tiger grinned as he walked down the hallway of the Zonessian Embassy and dropped the phone into one of the trashcans by the door. His smirk widened as he made it to the other side of the intersection from the building, before the large glass door shattered as a large explosion went off from one of the trashcans.

"Phase one, complete."

* * *

Well, not even 24 hours later, a New chapter, I'm on a roll today. :P enjoy. Things are just starting to get interesting. We're nowhere near done with this fic.


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